Six Months Gone

It’s the last day of June! 2015 is half over. I’m getting sick of saying time flies, so from now on I’ll have to accept that time will always go a little too fast for my liking. (Except that boring hour from 2.30 to 3.30 in the afternoon. That drags.)

So, how are the 15 goals going?

1. Visit fifty new places. Well thirty out of fifty isn’t bad for the halfway point in the year. The best places have been Rome and Bologna, but in exploring London my favourite discoveries have been BB Bakery, the rooftop cinema at the Golden Bee, Madison (a rooftop bar with views of St Paul’s – I seem to have an affinity for places that are high up…) and all the theatres!

Darling cake, BB Bakery

2. Go on holiday. I went on a fun, busy weekend trip to Rome, and it was brilliant. I definitely want to take advantage of having a better choice of cheap flights here! (Posts here and here – still to write about Rome itself really…!)

Vatican City, view from St Peter’s

3. Learn some Italian and German. My basic Italian is… basic, but it wasn’t in place until this year, so I’ve learned something. And I have my eye on a course starting in September, I just need to be organised and sign up in time. As for German, if I learn a couple of sentences then that’s more than I knew before.

4. Read two books a month. I’ve managed closer to three books a month, and that’s not including the many books I start and never finish. My favourites have been Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley and The Versions of Us by Laura Barnett. I am currently reading (and kind of engrossed in) Echo Boy by Matt Haig, although reading it while watching Humans is making me look at some people and wonder if they’re actually robots…

A post shared by Lauren (@wakeupyourluck) on Jun 7, 2015 at 2:14am PDT

5. Go to a dance class. I have been back to Zumba, but I would love to return to tap dancing or try swing dancing!

6. Learn how to make a cocktail. Sarah tried to teach me how to make a porn star martini, but we had to substitute so many ingredients that I’m not sure it counted. I might go to a cocktail-making class.

A shot of Prosecco, you say? How about a second glass instead?

7. Keep a happiness jar. I have not contributed happy things quite as often as I should have, but here are a random couple I picked out just now:

8. Submit a poem to a competition or magazine. To be honest, I’d like to revise this to ‘write a good one’. I might change it to write 1000 words a month. Not ambitious, but far more than I’m writing just now.

9. Volunteer. I have joined the entertainment committee, which organises work events and raises money for charity in the process. However, I had hoped to start another volunteer placement soon and it fell through, so I’d like to find something else. We even get a volunteer day each year at work, so I will see if there are any upcoming events in London where it would be good to help out.

10. Spend less time on the computer. This is such a boring goal. And I’m not sure if I’m managing it. I’m certainly not making better use of my time. I’m going to change this.

11. Save money every month. Treat myself once a month. Saving wasn’t working out very well. Treating myself is way too easy. I’m changing this to ‘Find one great free thing to do in London each month’. Compromise.

My baby. One of my big treats.

12. Eat a greater variety of food. Everyone stop for a second: I tried pigs’ ears. This is not something I am particularly proud of. We went to a fancy restaurant for my friend’s birthday and I literally only liked two types of bread, so I tried pig ears because it was the cheapest thing on the menu. My friend said they were like pork scratchings (obviously I didn’t finish them). I wouldn’t get them again, but there’s no denying that I’m trying far more food than I ever have.

13. Gain 500 blog followers. I’m on 445, so this is possible!

14. Respond to the WordPress Daily Prompt or Challenges twice a month. I’ve managed nine out of twelve opportunities. However, I have also taken part in Weekend Coffee Share and Top Ten Tuesdays, so that’s not bad. However, lately posts have dropped to a little under once a week, so I’d love to get back to posting a couple of times each week.

15. Comment on other blogs at least once a week. I am getting far better at this, as I tend to see what’s happening on WordPress if I’m having lunch at my desk (95% of the time).

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The goals aren’t going too badly at all! They must be too easy. (Full details on progress here.) If I can sign up to a language course and check out a cocktail-making class, then those will be a fun couple of activities for the latter half of the year.

I also managed to tick three items off the bucket list: eat carbonara in Italy, go to a spa and see The Book of Mormon, so that is pretty good going for six months. Although the bucket list is looking pretty sparse… I’ll just have to come up with more daft ideas.

Welcome to Wake Up Your Luck! I'm Lauren, and this is where I declare random goals and resolutions in the hope that I will stick with them rather than fail in public. I mainly post about places I’ve been, books I’ve read and things that make me happy.

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